Both are 23 years old. Both are
from Chicago, raised a 20-minute drive from
each other.

The similarities are striking.

Both made waves in the Chicago
hip hop scene before working with Kanye West, who raised their
profiles with performances on "Saturday Night Live." Chance wrote
five songs for Kanye's album "The Life of Pablo," and
dropped a stage-stealing verse on the song "Ultralight
Beam." A few months later, Kanye appeared on the opening
track of Chance's new album,
"All We Got."

Chance remains an independent
artist — and proud of it. He's steadfastly refused to sign a
record deal, and it's become a defining part of his career.
Mensa, on the other hand, signed on to Jay Z's Roc Nation label
and wrote a whole
song about it.

The two have a healthy rivalry going on. As Chance rapped in
his song "Acid Rain": "And I still get jealous of Vic/And
Vic's still jealous of me/But if you touch my brother/All that
anti-violence s--- goes out the window along with you/And the
rest of your team."